[Typo3-dev] Dates in non-UNIX format

[Martin T. Kutschker]

David Bruehlmeier wrote:
> Hi list,
> 
> in October, I had posted an RFC to collect requirements for a new data
> format to store dates in a non-UNIX format.
> (http://typo3.org/documentation/mailing-lists/dev-list-archive/thread/67703/
> ). In the meantime, I collected your posts from the WIKI and today, I sent
> the final version of the requirements to Kasper.

I remeber this.

But I also recall that I didn't see a point in a discussion, if 
requirement 3 already defines the storage type. What else is left to 
discuss.

I myself would have chosen Julian dates. They have a reasonable range 
and are integers (=> easy sorting).

As for ISO and sorting with b.c. dates: They'll be sorted wrongly 
anyway, because the sort order of the year would have to change in the 
middle of the query.

But if you use ISO notation, eg:

-2000
-1000
+1000
+2000

You can achieve this:

SELECT 0+(left(d,5)) as year FROM t ORDER BY year

But I don't know how protable the forced casting to int is.

And it only gets the years correct. The days within the years will still 
be in the wrong order.

Seems much overhead for a little used feature. I vote for dropping 
support of b.c. dates or intriduction of two types:

* simple type (a.c.)
* complete type (b.c. and a.c.)

Masi